You landed somewhere in the middle of a story.
Let me catch you up.
I am Jessica Gabrielzyk. Brazilian, living in Switzerland, writing in English about the things that happen when your life moves and you have to figure out who you are on the other side. I write about change. This is where it all lives.
About Jessica Gabrielzyk
The immigrant mother who learned the hard way and wrote it down.
I grew up in São Paulo. Then Australia, almost ten years in Brisbane, studying at Griffith University. Then Portugal. Then Ireland. Then Portugal again. Then Switzerland, where I have been since.
My daughter was born in Portugal and moved to Switzerland when she was practically a newborn. She has been navigating a country that was not hers since before she could walk. I have a husband who is my biggest cheerleader, a toddler who taught herself the word tired, and a habit of waking up at 2am with questions I cannot answer until morning.
I am not an academic. I am not a coach. I am a member of SIETAR, the Society for Intercultural Education, Training and Research. My books are not theory. They are what happens when you live something long enough to understand it and then sit down to write it for the next person who is in the middle of it right now.
I did not set out to become an author so much as to write down what I desperately needed to read. The gap was real so I wrote the book I could not find.
The reader I wrote for has been reading books written for someone else and filling in the gaps herself. These books were written for the gaps.
Books by Jessica Gabrielzyk
Three books. One map. Every stage of the expat parent journey.
Pregnancy
Maternity Abroad: Becoming a Mother in a Foreign Land
I paid close to ten thousand euros for my daughter's birth in Portugal because nobody had warned me. I wrote this so the next mother would not find out the expensive way. Healthcare, finding help, the best café in town, and everything in between.
🏆 Prêmio Loba 2025 — Nominated, Non-Fiction Published Book
🏆 Prêmio Destaque Literário 2025 — Nominated by the Academia Internacional de Literatura Brasileira in two categories
Early Childhood
My First American Coloring Book: Everyday Life in the U.S. for Little Hands
My daughter was going to grow up between cultures and needed a map of a world she had not yet entered. So I made the map. 101 illustrations of real American daily life for toddlers from age two. Screen-free. For expat families, immigrant parents, homeschoolers, and anyone raising a child who is curious about the world.
Read about My First American Coloring Book →
Identity
Parenting Unpacked: Parenting Through the Loss of Self
I stopped recognising myself in the middle of doing everything right and could not find a single book that named what was happening. I wrote this for the parent who is inside that moment right now. Endorsed by Ruth E. Van Reken, co-author of Third Culture Kids.
Read about Parenting Unpacked →
🏆 Number one bestseller on Amazon Brasil — Importados de Emigração e Imigração
🏆 Destaques Literários AILB 2026 — Running in Auto-Ajuda and Crônicas e Contos
The Blog
If the books are the map, the blog is the conversation happening while you are using it.
It is where the concepts get named before they make it into books. Where the cast members speak for themselves. Where the real numbers from the demarketing experiment get published every month, including the ones that are not impressive. Where the 2am thoughts land when they are too specific for a book and too real to leave unsaid.
If you want the bite-sized version of everything happening in this world, the blog is where it lives.
The Cast
This blog has a cast. Here is who they are.
Ruth E. Van Reken - THE ENDORSEMENT
Co-author of Third Culture Kids. Co-founder of Families in Global Transition. She endorsed Parenting Unpacked.
Papa Balla Ndong - THE ONE WORD
Human Migration Expert. Executive President of SIETAR Europa. He read the post about the book and left one word: wonderful.
Author of Holding the Fort Abroad. She asked me for coffee. She had super seeds. I had tea. She called the coloring book brilliant.
Julia Kerscht Squassoni - THE VOICE MESSAGE
President of SIETAR Brasil. Intercultural facilitator. She sent a voice message before I had brushed my teeth saying I write beautifully.
Luciana Gomide - THE COINCIDENCE THAT WASN’T
The author who endorsed Maternity Abroad and then selected your writing anonymously for Mulheres em Travessia without knowing it was yours. That story is too good not to be in the cast.
My daughter - THE REASON
She learned the word tired. She does not know the coloring book was made for her. She is the whole point of most of this.
My husband - THE CHEERLEADER
My biggest supporter and therefore not my most objective source of information. He is always there. He is always proud. He is not always right.
Pick the one that sounds most like where you are right now
If you are navigating a new country, raising a child between cultures, or just trying to figure out who you are now that everything has changed, you are in the right place.
Start anywhere. I will be here.
Jessica Gabrielzyk